037.

He reached out with his arms, kicked his legs behind him, and aimed for the part of the map cartographers decorated with dragons and serpents: the end of the world. 

The end of the world they knew, at least.  That was the sea he wanted to swim in – there between where the waters of the world fall down into the deep oblivion and where monsters roost who would capsize ships, obliterate their crews and let the gold and greed in their hulls drift to the rocks below.

Whiskey and will kept the cold off his skin but didn’t stop his legs from becoming bags of languorous sand that grew more difficult to demand movement from.  He could still see the cliff he sprung from.  If the crowd was still there waiting, their jaunts and jeers couldn’t make the journey to his ears.

He turned and swam again toward the dragons.

036.

“Please let them finish before Annie gets here,” he pleaded to the empty room.  Curses and accusations hurtled out from the inside of the building across the street, shattering the normal afternoon stillness. 

Summer meant every window was open.  His.  Theirs.  He’d wanted to avoid all the muffled conversations and boisterous, intruding laughter when she arrived.  Let alone this.  She’d be here soon and the sudden squabble across the way wasn’t subsiding. 

He stared at the cracked ceiling above the newly clean living room.  He couldn’t make out their words entirely but whatever followed “You supposed to…” wasn’t any acceptable answer for “Why you…?”

The voices grew louder, angrier, more distinct.  A car door slammed, punctuating the argument.  He looked out the window and saw the rusted out Ford -- the one he’d thought immobile -- speed off.

“Thank God,” he whispered just before seeing Annie’s car round the corner.

035.

“You’ve grown!”

His face had ripened with experience since I last saw him. A layer of survivor’s awareness was in his gaze now, atop the measured hate I recognized from over twenty years ago.

I was nine years old then, past the age to be scared of things rattling in the closet. He would scratch tree branches against my bedroom window to wake me up and distort the midnight bedroom shadows into onerous, creeping monstrosities.

“Why are you here?” I asked, feeling nine again, bracing for the impact of his answer.

“We both got promotions, Billy! Let’s celebrate!” He patted my arm too hard in mock-congratulations.

His breath smelled like saw dust. I remembered it wafting across the room, paralyzing me under the blankets.

“What does something like you get promoted to?”

“Why, I’m nyctophobia now! Fear of night and the dark. I really couldn’t have done it without you.”

034.

Dear Current Occupant,

Congratulations on the recent purchase of your home. Your accomplishment in this troubling financial climate is a celebration of your hard work. Your success is the result of your ambition and drive -- traits sadly lacking in our society today.

As you know, prosperity is seldom a given thing. You've made important sacrifices each time you reached for the next rung on the ladder. On behalf of BLZ Enterprises I would like to extend a special reward to you as our way of saying thank you for showing the rare determination necessary to take the next step in life.

Please take a few moments to review the enclosed brochure of available rewards. We’ve taken great pains to have something of benefit for all lifestyles: musical ability, money, youth, women, men or anything else you might desire.

I look forward to discussing our terms with you soon.

Sincerely,

033.

Halfway through their set the crowd cheered “Pearls!” They heard it when they walked on stage and again during every lull in the show. Overworked Pearls. The number one hit. The song for the girl Craig nicknamed Pearl. The girls in the front row didn’t know she was real.

The drummer looked at him and grimaced. He knew Craig wouldn’t want to play it. Craig had been more reluctant to perform it the further the band drove into their success, and especially not tonight. Not after the news. Yet Craig abruptly muttered “give it to them,” and retreated to a corner of the stage.

He stood silent at the end, nearly hidden in shadow, as the girls in the front row sang the final line: “unfurled and undone.” The crowd roared at the finish. Unheard against the noise of their satisfaction Craig instead improvised “but the girl is gone.”

032.

“I met John when we were three years old. It’s hazy, but… I can see him standing in the driveway of our house on Sutherland. I sat on the tailgate of my parents’ Scout waiting to go see Star Wars at the drive-in. We had the stilted kind of conversation kids that age have. He said he wanted to go. I said I was excited. He said again that he wanted to go.

“Heh.

"He did eventually go, by the way.

“And Laura. We met you when we moved in upstairs during junior year. You pounded on our door late one night, furious at the noise, and we both fell for you. Madly. But he’s the one who got you and the two of you were an inspiration to me through the years.

“Now he’s gone though, and I miss him. You were his better half but he was mine.”

031.

Once upon a time there was the end.

030.

“…and the lease gives us the option of renewing after thirteen weeks,” finished the real estate agent.

“You have the option to renew?”

“Mr. Johnson, look...”

She opened the front door to reveal the immense floor plan. Almost everything was the same as the pictures she had shown him in her office. The giant bay window beside the door spread late morning sunlight across the empty great room. The great room spilled into a spacious dining area adjacent to a very modern kitchen behind French doors. A polished staircase disappeared into the high ceiling on the opposite side of the room. The plush expanse of carpet before him looked like it had never before been stepped on by human toes. It flowed all the way to the studio audience and three cameramen, all looking at him expectantly. They had not been in the pictures.

“Keep them happy and we renew.”

029.

“Remind her of the gun.”

“They’re doing fine on their own.”

“Yeah, but I want to see what happens. The look on his face. Do you think she’ll use it?”

“Maybe, but she’d miss. I don’t think she’s even held it before.” He pondered the question. His partner gave him the silence to think it through. She tried to not look at him expectedly. “If she does, it’ll be an accident. She won’t realize she’s squeezed the trigger,” he concluded.

“Then let’s see,” she grinned.

“What happens if she kills him?”

“What happens to the pawn when the knight takes it?”

“Fine. I’ll remind her.”

His partner clapped excitedly.

In a suburban home a million miles below a dejected housewife suddenly remembers the Glock 22 her husband keeps in his bedside drawer. He’s on the other side of the door she just slammed. Tonight she’s going to prove her point.